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Jewellery & Metal (MA)

Xiyi Chen

Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.

Xiyi Chen is a jewellery artist from Zhejiang China, based in London. She graduated from China Academy of Art (Fashion Product Design BA) in 2021 and presented the 'Girl's Rebellion' collection of jewellery designs at her graduation exhibition. She is currently graduating from the Royal College of Art (Jewellery & Metal MA).


She has experimented with the use of ancient proverbs as inspiration for her jewellery pieces. With a strong interest in the collision of literature and art, she has devoted her time at the RCA to the study of text and contemporary jewellery. Experimenting with jewellery as a new language to interpret the philosophies of ancient quotations.


Degree Details

School of Arts & HumanitiesJewellery & Metal (MA)RCA2023 at Truman Brewery

Truman Brewery, F Block, Ground, first and second floors

Use clear PLA to draw bubble gaps, make it into broken bubbles and string some glass beads. Reflect the sense of fleetingness.

The connection between people, the past and the present, words and interpretation, literature and jewellery is a transformation and a form of communication across space.


Writing is not only the act of human expression but also a reflection of the current artistic forms. As carriers of ideological ideas, there can be a close connection and collision between texts and jewellery.


In the eyes of Xiyi, jewellery creation goes beyond the physical form and delves into the extraction of metaphysical spiritual cores.


Based on such connections and resonances, she incorporates ancient sayings as the foundation for contemporary jewellery language and narrative, aiming to construct a bridge that spans across time and connects the present with the past.


Ancient sayings often embody their philosophical wisdom through metaphors, and metaphors are also one of the ways contemporary jewellery interprets its concepts. Interestingly, these metaphors often rely on the juxtaposition of two concepts, which can be contrasting or complementary, representing the differences between two positions or states and intertwining to create multiple possibilities.


Half of the piece is a basic polished ring and bangle, the other half is gilded section carved in the form of a water wave.
'Still water run deep' – 《The Classic of Mountains and Seas》 A metaphor for the apparently unassuming person who possesses great wisdom.
Embodied in the internal and external halves.
Embodied in the upper and lower halves.

Medium:

Silver, Gold plated
Crystallisation of bismuth on a portion of natural coral bone to produce coloured metal crystals.
'To live and let live' – 《I Ching》 The course of things, natural character is interconnected and interdependent. Either rise or fall together. As in the symbiotic system of coral and algae, where presence is colour, destruction is bleaching.
Crystallisation of bismuth on a portion of natural coral bone to produce coloured metal crystals.
Crystallisation of bismuth on a portion of natural coral bone to produce coloured metal crystals.
Crystallisation of bismuth on a portion of natural coral bone to produce coloured metal crystals.
Crystallisation of bismuth on a portion of natural coral bone to produce coloured metal crystals.
The copper and silver foil produces a coloured overlay on the surface of a coral ring made of silver.
The copper and silver foil produces a coloured overlay on the surface of a coral ring made of silver.
The copper and silver foil produces a coloured overlay on the surface of a coral ring made of silver.

Medium:

Silver, Brass Foil, Silver Foil, Natural Coral, Bismuth
Transparent PLA painted bubble gaps are made into broken bubbles strung with some glass beads.
‘All things contrived are like dream, illusion, bubble, shadow, and as dewdrop or lightning,They should be regarded as such.' – 《The Diamond Sutra》 Represents the brevity of life, like a blown bubble bursting in an instant, like a morning dewdrop suddenly gone, or like a flash of lightning.
Transparent PLA painted bubble gaps are made into broken bubbles strung with some glass beads.
Transparent PLA painted bubble gaps are made into broken bubbles strung with some glass beads.

Medium:

Transparent PLA, Glass Bead
fleeting
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.
‘When pearls are in abyss, cliff won’t go barren’ – 《Talking into Learning (Xun Zi) 》 The more turbulent the social environment, the greater the need for people with noble sentiments to uplift the social atmosphere, and these wise and elegant people are like jade and pearls, making the social environment better.
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.
Making the contrast with the silver being oxidized and retaining the area around the pearl as shiny.

Medium:

Silver, Pearl
contemporary-jewellery
A cyclical wreath made of brass embodying the cycle of bloom to decay.
‘Shrivels and thrives each year again’ – 《Farewell on the Ancient-Old Grassland》 Representing the law of the cycle of life from year to year. Bergsonge believes that understanding the meaning of time presupposes understanding the meaning of life, and one might even say that the meaning of time is the meaning of life.
A cyclical wreath made of brass embodying the cycle of bloom to decay.
A cyclical wreath made of brass embodying the cycle of bloom to decay.
A cyclical wreath made of brass embodying the cycle of bloom to decay.

Medium:

Brass
The interior of the jade vase is carved with tattered texture and covered with brass paint oxidized to produce a green patina.
‘Rubbish coated in golden jade’ – 《As the orange seller said》 As beautiful as the gold and jade on the appearance but as the tattered cotton interior. A mutilation is an instability, a passing away, an unfinishedness, a performance in opposition to clarity and completeness. 'Vase' - Another description of a person who is as beautiful as a vase on the exterior, but empty and devoid of substance on the interior.
The interior of the jade vase is carved with tattered texture and covered with brass paint oxidized to produce a green patina.
The interior of the jade vase is carved with tattered texture and covered with brass paint oxidized to produce a green patina.

Medium:

Jade, Bronze Paint
The silver and pearls are made to look as similar as possible in colour and form.
‘When false is taken for true, true becomes false, if non-being truns into being, being comes non-being’ – 《The red chamber》 When the fake is made real, the real is like the fake. When nothing becomes something, something is also nothing. There is no such thing as an comparison between real and fake for silver and pearls, and when I raise the subject, then this debate exists.
The silver and pearls are made to look as similar as possible in colour and form.
The silver and pearls are made to look as similar as possible in colour and form.

Medium:

Pearl, Silver
A combination of butterfly wings and pillows of varying sizes made by Jesmonite.
‘Dream argument’ – 《Zhuangzi: Discussion of the Equality of Things》 One is never certain whether what one sees is reality or illusion; changeable nature of human life. How does one know the real. If the dream is real enough. ‘I don't know whether I dream of butterflies or butterflies dream of me. Is my life the butterfly's dream or is the butterfly's life my dream.’

Medium:

Silver, Jesmonite, Butterfly wings
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Royal College of Art

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